


Anniversary

by Kass



Series: The Sentinel fanworks [12]
Category: The Sentinel
Genre: 2000, First Time, Jim/Blair - Freeform, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-09
Updated: 2008-12-09
Packaged: 2017-10-02 03:33:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,928
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kass/pseuds/Kass
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jim celebrates an anniversary, of sorts. Published in 2000.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Anniversary

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks, as always, to Justine for her beta-read.

Blair was almost singing as he climbed the stairs, humming some perky, syncretic Irish reel off the Afro-Celt Sound System album he'd been listening to in the car. It was just after sundown, and his ears were cold from the winter air, and he could smell wood smoke from someone's fireplace somewhere, and he was in a really good mood.

Because maybe it was their fireplace with a fire in it, and maybe he'd get a decent night's sleep tonight, and best of all, he was about to actually see his room-mate.

The last two weeks they'd been passing like ships in the night: Jim had a heavy caseload, and Blair was hip-deep in grad school. First came the memo, the one that started "PhD candidates are advised to bear the department's publication requirements in mind." And Blair dug through his bookshelves to find the thick olive folder, and dug through the folder to find the relevant piece of paper, and read there that he was supposed to have published a minimum of three articles by February. Which he hadn't done. And February was next week. Which meant he had to scramble.

And because things always happen in threes, Blair got slammed with a grant proposal and a teaching fellow application, too. Of course, he didn't _have_ to apply for the grant; but only in the sense that he didn't _have_ to eat, either. Ditto for the teaching fellowship thing: as long as he was content to have even less money than he did now, he didn't have to apply for a damn thing.

So he was applying for both. And revising an article he'd written the previous semester, which he'd set aside with the best of intentions ("I just need a few weeks off, I've worked on it too much to be objective, but as soon as I get a breather I'll come back and polish this baby up") and had never looked at again. Blair was up to his neck in paperwork.

All of this meant that he'd barely had a chance to stop home to change his clothes, much less go to the station, much less spend any time with his partner.

He'd been expecting to spend Saturday night at his office, too - but wonder of wonder, miracle of miracles, something finally clicked and he cranked through everything by six. The article was finished (or as close to finished as it was going to get) and stuck under the chairman's door, the grant app was sealed and in the department secretary's box for mailing, the teaching fellow app was completed and in his advisor's mailbox awaiting signature. Blair locked his office door and left.

When Blair opened the door the loft was dark. He thought it was empty, which confused him, since he'd seen Jim's truck parked outside. He tried to ignore his small pang of disappointment. It's not like Jim knew I was coming home, he thought. And it's not like I'd expect him to stay home to see me anyway. Shit, it's a Saturday, he's probably out on a date.

These weren't new thoughts, but Blair still didn't like them.

Blair sighed, quietly. "Guess no one's home," he said aloud as he shrugged out of his jacket and dropped his bag.

"I'm here," Jim said, and Blair realized there was a figure sitting on the sofa, in shadow.

"Jeez, Jim, what are you doing in the dark?" Blair asked, not expecting an answer. A tendril of excitement uncurled in his ribcage. Blair did his best to ignore it, walking past his partner to switch on a lamp.

"'s not dark to me," Jim pointed out, wincing a little as his eyes adjusted.

With the lamp on Blair could see Jim clearly: half-slumped, half-sprawled, an opened fifth of whiskey in his hand.

"Having a cocktail?" Blair asked wryly. Oh boy, he thought. This doesn't look good.

"I'm celebrating," Jim explained. Blair raised an eyebrow. "Today's a special day." There was a pause.

"You gonna enlighten me?"

"It's my anniversary," Jim said. "Or it would've been."

Blair sat down opposite his partner, trying to gauge Jim's condition. He didn't look too bad, Blair thought. (Actually, he looked fantastic - tight jeans, black tank top - but Blair was supposed to be assessing Jim's emotional state, not his physical one, so he nipped that train of thought in the bud.) He seemed okay: his face was calm, his posture lazy, nothing to suggest a problem. Still, this drinking-alone-in-the-dark thing worried Blair a little.

In the midst of these thoughts, Jim spoke up. "Marriage is a remarkable institution, you know."

Blair looked at him. "How much of that whiskey have you drunk?" he asked, trying to see the level of liquid in Jim's bottle.

"Two people deciding to try to make things work long-term," Jim continued, ignoring him. "Against all odds. Despite the vagaries of fate. It's touching, really."

He's got to be drunk, Blair thought. He tried to figure out how to answer.

"Of course, I wasn't cut out for marriage," Jim said, conversationally.

"Oh?" Blair prompted. One strategy when you don't know what to say, he thought: keep the other guy talking.

"Nope. It couldn't have worked. For one thing, I'm a single-minded son of a bitch who's so obsessed with his job that any kind of meaningful emotional interaction is impossible," Jim said. His voice had a shade of bitterness to it now.

Blair stared. "Jim, you're full of shit," he said. "You're dedicated to your work. But that's a good quality, not a bad one." He was searching a little for words. "You're the best detective on the force, for God's sake."

"I'm also stubborn, tight-fisted, egomaniacal and a prick," Jim continued. He sounded matter-of-fact. As if these things were obvious.

Realization dawned on Blair like a cartoon light-bulb. This litany must have come from Carolyn. All at once? A series of fights? Either way, Jim had memorized every word. Probably not on purpose, but he'd memorized it. Sounded like the words were carved deep. They didn't pose any new pain - just kept the pain they'd already inflicted alive. And on the day that would have been their wedding anniversary, Jim brought them back out to refresh the wounds.

Ouch.

Blair felt uneasy watching Jim torture himself. He wondered how long this solitary ritual had been going on. He had a mental image of Jim sitting motionless as the loft darkened, castigating himself with memory.

It's time, Blair thought, to get him out of this.

"Well, okay, you're stubborn," Blair said, as if he had to concede the point, and was rewarded with a small laugh from Jim. "But the rest of that is ridiculous."

"I don't know how to care for other people."

"Oh, that explains why you taught me how to use crutches when I sprained my ankle," Blair said, nodding. "That explains why you always materialize with a pack of frozen peas when I smash my head into something. Yeah, Jim, that must be it: you're _uncaring_."

Blair wasn't sure he'd ever sounded so sarcastic. His opinion of Carolyn was degenerating. Of course, he wasn't exactly unbiased; there was an undercurrent of jealousy when he thought of her, he knew that. She'd had something with Jim that Blair was never going to get, and what's worse, she'd been stupid enough to let it go.

"I'm a miserable excuse for a human being," Jim pointed out.

Something in Blair's ribcage ached. It wasn't the words themselves that made him wince; it was the way Jim said them. As if they were lodged so deep they seemed like fact. How long had Jim been carrying this?

"It's not true, Jim," Blair answered. He felt helpless.

"I don't know the meaning of friendship," Jim said thoughtfully, turning the whiskey bottle around in his hand and contemplating its label before taking another swig.

"Bullshit!" Blair said, louder than he meant to. Jim looked at him, a muted curiosity in his eyes. "You're the best friend I've ever had."

"I'm incapable of commitment, I can't cook worth a damn and I'm lousy in the sack," Jim said with finality.

"You've never had any problem with commitment that I can see - not with your men in Peru, not with Simon, not with me. Jesus, you're loyal to a fault," Blair countered. "You're a fine cook, even if you harbor a secret wish for arteriosclerosis." This got a small smile. "And for that last one," Blair paused and felt his heart pound for a second, "I wouldn't exactly know."

He hoped he sounded sufficiently disinterested to keep Jim fooled.

"Yeah, yeah, and you wouldn't care to either," Jim said, looking down at the bottle of whiskey as if he'd heard the words a thousand times.

"I didn't say that," Blair retorted. It was an automatic response to the tone in Jim's voice: the self-loathing cut through Blair's defenses, short-circuiting his rational mind.

Then Blair had a second to realize what he'd said. Oh my God, he thought. What am I doing? Jim flickered a glance at him, a glance Blair couldn't decipher.

"Spare me, Sandburg," Jim said, taking another swig of bourbon. "I've seen your type. She's cute and perky, or she's cute and exotic, and she's got legs up to here. But one way or another, she's cute - and she's female."

What the hell was going on? Was Jim (couldn't be) - what was that tinge in his voice: jealous, resentful, wistful? Blair couldn't figure it out. Maybe Jim was toying with him. Maybe it was the whiskey. Jim sounded certain. Almost smug. And it pissed Blair off enough that he decided to fight back.

"Actually, Jim, you're wrong," he said. "My 'type' is _people_. Interesting people, attractive people, people I happen to care about. Gender has nothing to do with it."

There, that'll shut him up, Blair thought. I may have just thrown his image of me out a window, but at least it'll stop this conversation. He glanced at Jim's bourbon, which was looking more appealing by the minute.

Jim looked at him. "That still doesn't mean I'm your type," he said. Goading. "Who says I'm interesting or attractive, anyway?"

"Jim, what the -" Blair began, starting to feel angry, and then he remembered Carolyn's venomous speech. If Jim had spent all afternoon reopening old wounds, which it appeared that he had, this self-deprecation wasn't an act, it was real. "You're more than interesting, you're fascinating," Blair started, keeping his voice quiet.

"As a subject for study," Jim cut in.

"No, you asshole, as a person to talk to and spend time with," Blair shot back. He was on some kind of strange see-saw: half-annoyed at Jim for acting like a jerk, half-aching for the hurt he could see underneath. With a small dash of apprehension thrown in. Shit, he'd just come out to Jim Ellison and Jim hadn't even batted an eye.

"Still," Jim said. "I'm a bitch to live with and I'm not much to look at."

"First, I already live with you, so that's a moot point," Blair answered. He could feel his blush rising. "And second, you're so sexy half our friends spend every waking moment wanting to jump you."

There: honest without admitting too much. He hoped.

There was a pause. Jim seemed to be mulling something over.

"So which half are you in?"

"Huh?"

"Which half. Of our friends." Jim took a sip of whiskey and returned the bottle to his lap.

Blair decided to take the offensive. "What is this, twenty questions? This whole conversation is moot. It doesn't matter which half I'm in. You don't date men."

"Now _you're_ putting words in _my_ mouth," Jim said, and smiled. It was a slow smile, almost - what? Predatory, Blair thought. Jim hadn't moved, was still sprawled indolent across the couch, but somehow the depression had departed his limbs and been replaced with a new tension. Feline. Like his totem panther, sleek and coiled to spring.

Blair was elated. And terrified. And aroused. He shifted slightly in his chair, his jeans suddenly feeling tight across his groin.

He was also, momentarily, dumbfounded.

"You really shouldn't make assumptions, Sandburg," Jim chided. Something like laughter danced in his eyes. "You know, this is a fascinating conversation. Maybe we should continue it over dinner."

This really is the Twilight Zone, Blair thought.

"Dinner sounds good," Blair said. See, he thought, I can take this. So my world's just turned upside-down, big deal. This happens to me every day.

_Not_.

"Why don't you shower, I'll call Firelli's and see if they can take two for," Jim consulted his watch, "eight or eight-fifteen?"

"Great," Blair said, and stood, and walked to the bathroom. He could feel Jim's eyes on him the whole way there.

It made him tingle.

* * *

 

Blair came out of the bathroom wrapped in a towel. He'd spent the duration of his shower fighting the impulse to yell, to panic, to whoop with nervous delight.

He'd replayed the conversation a dozen times, and it kept leading to the same surreal conclusion. Yep, Blair thought. Any way you slice it, I just admitted I have a thing for Jim, and not only did he not freak out, but he gave me that _smile_ and asked me out.

Blair's neck was bent and he was towelling the excess water from his curls, which is how he managed to walk straight into Jim, who was conveniently standing braced against the door to Blair's room.

Blair, startled, let go of the hand-towel and it fell. Jim just waited, arms crossed across his chest, looking at Blair appraisingly.

"You're kind of in the way," Blair said, going for nonchalant.

Jim's eyes glinted. "Move me," he said.

That, Blair decided, was an invitation if he'd ever heard one.

He pressed up against his friend's body and gave a little push with his hips as he pulled Jim down for a kiss. In an instant Jim's arms went around him, Jim's mouth opened to his tongue, and through his towel Blair could feel evidence of Jim's desire.

The kiss was electrifying. So was the press of body against body. Blair broke away and placed a kiss on Jim's neck. Jim sighed, a quiet "ohh" that set all Blair's nerve endings on fire.

"Maybe we should order takeout," Blair said.

"Yeah," Jim murmured, and Blair wasn't sure if that was a "yeah" to the takeout idea, or a "yeah" to the general direction things were moving in, but at that moment he didn't exactly care. He placed his hands on Jim's chest and gave a small push.

"In," he said, and Jim moved in, and Blair followed.

"Bed," Jim said, pulling Blair onto the futon.

And then Blair was on his back and Jim was braced over him and Jim's mouth was on his nipple and Blair was sighing.

"Mm. God that's good."

Jim didn't answer, and a thought found its way into Blair's desire-fogged head. "Jim," he said, and Jim still didn't answer, and Blair tugged on his partner's tank top to move him.

With a look somewhere between exasperation and amusement, Jim moved until his mouth was level with Blair's ear. "What?" he asked, and licked Blair's earlobe.

Blair shivered. "You're not - you're not going to freak out about this in the morning, are you?" he asked.

Jim bit the ear gently. "I'm not exactly a blushing virgin, Sandburg," he murmured.

The phrase conjured, in Blair's mind, an immediate image of the kind of history Jim would have to have had in order to not be a blushing virgin, and Blair could feel his cock twitch in response.

"Oh God," Blair said, faintly.

Jim sucked softly at his neck. "What?" he asked, his voice a buzz against Blair's skin.

"Just...mental images," Blair managed.

"Hmm?" Jim was kissing his way down to Blair's chest now, but it sounded like he wanted to hear more, so Blair obliged.

"Of you. Of what I want to do with you," he murmured, and Jim licked at one nipple, little rasping licks, and Blair's hands tightened in the blanket.

Fingers found his other nipple and gave the ring an experimental tug, and it wrenched Jim's name from his lips.

"Jim! I -"

But Blair didn't finish what he was going to say because strong knees were pushing his legs apart and sure fingers were rubbing him hard through terrycloth and for a short time Blair was incapable of speech.

Somehow he regained control, and managed to make his mouth form the word "stop," and then Jim was rolling away from him looking confused.

"Now what, Sandburg?" he asked.

Blair blushed. "It's just - shit, you're still dressed, and I'm, like, dangerously close to coming, here, and I don't even know if you're enjoying yourself." As soon as the word "coming" left his mouth something deepened in Jim's eyes and Blair could feel his voice getting lower under Jim's scrutiny.

"I'm enjoying myself," Jim said, his voice thick.

"Can I kiss you?" Blair asked, and Jim moved in again, and as they kissed Blair reached for Jim's shirt and pulled it up and they broke long enough to get the tank top off of Jim and onto the floor. Blair was on top now, and the sight of Jim beneath him, of his body (which it was finally okay for Blair to long for) vanishing into the waistband of his jeans, made Blair hum with satisfaction.

"God," he murmured, "You don't know how long I've wanted..." And he bent to kiss Jim's jaw, loving the fine rub of stubble against his face. He rubbed a thumb over a nipple, and Jim groaned, and Blair smiled. "I want to touch you," he said.

"Touch me," Jim repeated, and Blair bent to breathe through Jim's jeans, mouthing him through the fabric, and Jim made a small sound of wanting, almost a whimper.

"Ohhh yeah," Blair murmured through the cloth, and Jim tensed, fighting for control.

"Wait," he gritted. "Too much."

Blair pulled back, unfastened the jeans and pushed them a few inches down Jim's hips, and freed Jim from the confines of his boxers. One reverent lick and Jim gasped. A second and Jim was sighing. And then Blair had Jim in his mouth and Jim choked out his name and stiffened and came.

Some minutes later Jim reached for Blair's head, which was pillowed on his stomach, and pulled Blair up to him.

"I was going to make you come first," Jim said.

Maybe it was the newness of it all: even hearing the words in Jim's voice made Blair quiver.

"Why?" Blair asked. "Why's it matter?"

There was something guarded in Jim's face. He shrugged.

The memory of the afternoon's litany drifted back into Blair's mind, and suddenly he understood.

"Say my name?" Blair asked.

Jim looked at him a little strangely, but complied. "Blair," he said.

Blair shivered. "Again," he said, lying next to Jim, letting himself relax into the bed.

"Blair," Jim murmured, close to his ear this time, and Blair couldn't restrain a gasp.

"Blair," he whispered, tongue darting into Blair's ear and hand moving toward Blair's erection, and Blair groaned.

And then Jim's hand was on his cock, no towel in the way this time, and Blair couldn't stop sighing. "Oh God, Jim," he murmured, thrusting up.

"Blair," the word a caress now, half-smothered by the flesh of Blair's throat, which Jim was sucking at, and Blair felt like he'd never been so hard in his life.

And Jim pulled away long enough to wet a finger in his mouth, and slid the finger toward Blair's ass, and Blair sighed a "yes," and Jim pinned him between pleasure and pleasure. And then Jim moved down, and took Blair's cock in his mouth, and a fraction of a second later Blair's entire body exploded in orgasm.

After a moment Jim let him go and moved silently back up the bed. Blair pushed over next to him, Jim's arms went around him, the two men spooned together.

"Purr," Blair said lazily.

Jim chuckled. "Yeah?"

"Yeah," Blair said, adamantly.

A few minutes went by.

"Blair?"

"Yeah?"

"What was up with the name thing?"

"Um." How much to disclose? Oh, well, can't make the evening any weirder, Blair decided. "How come you wanted to make me get off first?"

"I asked you first," Jim said.

"It's because of -" Blair began, then realized he didn't want to say her name quite yet, didn't want to bring her into bed with them. "It's because of her, isn't it?"

He felt Jim sigh. "Yeah," Jim admitted. "Boy, she had a whole rant about that one. You'd have thought I shot her dog instead of just having the gall to come before she did."

"I wanted you to remember who I was," Blair said. "I'm not her, Jim."

"Thank God for small blessings," Jim quipped, and Blair reached behind to give him a thwack.

"I mean it."

"I know who you are, Sandburg. It's not like I could confuse you two." Jim sounded slightly exasperated.

And now I'm back to 'Sandburg,' Blair thought. "That's not what I mean, Jim. Sometimes old patterns die hard," he said.

"Mm," Jim said, noncommittally.

"And I don't know what her problem was, but it's not like I only get off on having you do things to me. It works both ways. I really enjoyed touching you." Blair could feel a blush rising. "I've been imagining it for ages now, anyway."

"You have?" Jim sounded pleased.

"Shit yeah," Blair said. What the hell, he thought. "There was another reason I wanted you to say my name," he admitted.

"Mm?"

"I really like hearing you say it," Blair said.

"Mm," Jim said. And then, lips pressed into the back of Blair's neck, "Blair."

Blair shivered.

"Blair," again, softly. "Blair, Blair, Blairrr."

He couldn't stand it: he turned in Jim's arms, pulled himself on top, and kissed him. Hard.

* * *

  
After Jim offered to arm-wrestle him for the privilege of staying in bed while one of them got up to order dinner, Blair magnanimously stood and pulled on a robe and ordered Chinese. By the time he was off the phone Jim was up, walking naked up the stairs to get himself a pair of sweatpants.

And Blair kept expecting things to feel awkward, or strange, or weird. And they just didn't.

They ate dinner, they watched a little TV, they even drank a little bourbon (mixed with Coke now that Jim wasn't nursing his sorrows). After a while they wound up curled together on the couch, television on and largely ignored, attention mostly on each other.

"Jim?"

"Mm?"

Blair was running his fingers along one of Jim's hands, which was wrapped loosely around him.

"Did you know I had a thing for you?"

Jim paused and seemed to be thinking. "Nah," he said. "Not until today."

"Hm," Blair said.

There was a pause.

"Chief?"

"Yeah?"

"Thanks," Jim said, quietly.

"For what?"

"For talking me out of my funk."

Blair grinned. "The pleasure was mine," he said.

"Only half," Jim pointed out.

"You're so predictable. I knew you were going to say that."

"Hm. Smartass. You know what I'm going to say now?"

"Yeah," Blair said, because he did.

Jim gave a small sigh. "Blairrr," he murmured.

Blair's bones turned to jelly. "I never should've told you that," he said, trying to sound like he was complaining.

Of course, he wasn't complaining. And Jim knew it.

And Blair didn't really mind.


End file.
